Montco Considering Lawsuit To Block Federal Carpool Act

Montgomery County's commissioners are pursuing every avenue possible to put the brakes on a federal law that will require many employers to cut the number of people commuting in their own cars.

The commissioners announced yesterday that are considering federal court action, sending a letter of protest to their U.S. legislators, and planning to raise objections with the state.

The law, part of the 1990 Clean Air Act, is aimed at reducing air pollution in metropolitan areas, such as the Philadelphia area, that severely violate federal smog standards.

"We all are good Americans," Commissioner Chairman Mario Mele said. "We all want a better quality of life. We also want better, clean air. But this is not the way to achieve it."

The law, which applies to firms with 100 or more employees, would cost companies $200 to $900 per employee to implement, Mele said.

"Most employers are having tremendous struggles to survive. It would be totally unfair to them to add this additional burden," he said. By November 1994, firms with 100 or more employees must have specific plans to reduce the number of cars coming to the workplace. The goal is a 25-percent reduction overall in a region.

The alternatives are car pooling and mass transit.

The requirement poses a special problem in rural areas such as the Upper Perkiomen Valley, where mass transit is not available and employees live over a wide area and in other counties.

About 60 percent of the workers in the five-county Philadelphia area will be affected by the law, county planners have said.

County Solicitor Thomas E. Waters Jr. said he is studying the county's legal options, which could involve litigation in federal court.

Commissioner Joseph M. Hoeffel said he hopes the other Philadelphia area counties will join Montgomery County in whatever action it takes.

But Bucks County is unlikely to follow suit, said Bucks Commissioner Chairman Andrew Warren, who called the law "stupid."

"It's a nonsensical law, but to compound that with a nonsensical suit does more nonsense to the public," he said.

Warren also said the law has already been challenged by another area and upheld by the federal courts.

A letter from Montgomery's commissioners went out this week to U.S. Sen. Arlen Specter and Sen. Harris Wofford as well as these members of Congress: Marjorie Margolies-Mezvinsky, D-13th; James C. Greenwood, R-8th; Paul McHale, D-15th; Curt Weldon, R-7th; and Timothy Holden, D-6th.

"We believe there must be a more reasonable balance between achieving clean air and maintaining a vibrant economy, in the Delaware Valley with an expanding job base," the commissioners said in the letter.

The commissioners urged the federal legislators to change the law to require only a 15-percent reduction, phased in over five years.

They complained that the clean air act is based on data from 1980. Since then, the area's air quality has improved greatly, Commissioner Jon D. Fox said.

But officials with the state Department of Environmental Resources have said the data being used is from 1988.

The DER is in charge of writing the regulations that will implement the federal Clean Air Act in Pennsylvania.

In 1988, the Philadelphia area exceeded ozone standards on 87 days, Wick Havens, acting chief of the DER's air resources management division, has said.

But it was over the standard on only 11 days in 1989, 12 in 1990, 22 in 1991 and just two in 1992.

Havens has said smog is dependent on weather and 1992 was cool.

"If a summer like 1988 reoccurs, what happens," he has said.

More than 50 percent of the smog is caused by vehicle emissions, Mary Ellen Bolish, a DER spokeswoman, has said.

The commissioners also complained that the law provides no federal funds for car pool incentives, mass transit improvements or tax credits for businesses that want to run vans to bring workers in.

The commissioners argued that it is unfair to require employers to comply fully with the law by Nov. 15, 1994.

But Chris Novak, a DER spokeswoman, said employers would have to meet 50 percent of the goal by November 1995, 80 percent by 1996 and 100 percent by 1997.

Employers with less than 1,000 employees might be given an extra year to reach the 50 percent mark, she said.

Philadelphia and three counties -- Bucks, Chester and Delaware -- agreed to a plan in which central Philadelphia would have to meet a 10 percent target but the suburbs and rural areas would have to reach a 28 percent goal.

An urban ring around central Philadelphia would have a 17-percent target.

The plan was approved by the Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission, a group made up of representatives from the five Philadelphia area counties, and submitted to the DER.

Although Montgomery County's representative voted for the plan, the county commissioners withheld their support. They were the only county commissioners to go against the plan, Warren said.

Warren said a plan had to be put in place by the region because "had we done nothing and not voted at all, the plan the state would have mandated to the suburbs would have been far worse."

That plan could have handed the city a 5 percent goal and the suburbs a 35 percent target, he said.

"I see it as a compromise, as something that was resolved between the suburbs and the city except for Montgomery County," he said.